Kate Rauner's Blog, page 63

Sad Victory Over Greatest Bird #nature #poem #poetry #birdwatching #birds

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Passenger pigeons by Audubon

Once upon a time,

Once there was a land

Where one bird

out of every two

Was gray with throat of cinnamon.

Their flocks eclipsed the sun

When migration season came.

One shotgun blast would bring down

Two dozen,

Without the need to aim.

With numbers in the trillions,

A breeding colony

Might blanket fifty miles

With its sovereignty.

And we killed them all.

They could lay waste to fields

But someone must have seen

Their numbers falling fast

And known what that would mean.

It took us several decades,

Less than a century

Of ruthless persecution

Of this farmers’ enemy.

To kill them all.

Do any mourn today

An action so draconian

While viewing stuffed remains

Of the last one

In the Smithsonian?

The last passenger pigeon.

By Kate Rauner

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The last passenger pigeon

Thanks to karlshuker for his post on the passenger pigeon. Visit http://reviverestore.org/ for a fascinating look into de-extinction. Reconstructing the passenger pigeon is their flagship project.

Their aim is to increase forest health and biodiversity, especially what’s been lost since the 1700s. Like wildfires, passenger pigeons were a major source of beneficial forest regeneration in eastern North America for tens of thousands of years.

Revive & Restore’s goal is “to hatch the first generation of new passenger pigeons by 2022 and begin trial wild releases ten years later.” Genome sequencing is already underway. Wow.

Filed under: Neat Science News Tagged: bird watcher, bird watching, birds, de-extinction, extinction, passenger pigeon, rewilding

Can’t Beat Scifi & Fantasy Bargain – How to Fill a Short Break or an Afternoon #free #scifi #fantasy

[image error]If you missed ebook week – No problem! Hurry and sign up before April 1st to download a free short reads collection. Mining Jupiter’s atmosphere, a parrot in space, tiny craft’s mission to Proxima Centuri, and challenge for another Noah  – science fiction and fantasy, short stories, flash fiction, a few bits of microfiction – and excerpts from my On Mars series – the first colony on Mars, starting in the near-future with Glory on Mars.

You’ll receive a coupon code for a free download from Smashwords on April 1st (no fooling.) Get it now before Jupiter Diving moves to Kidle Select.

Filed under: Neat Science News

Humans Slaughtered Mammoths But Can They Save Us from Climate Change? #global warming #rewilding #elephant

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Feral horse

Rewilding is “large-scale conservation aimed at restoring and protecting natural processes and core wilderness areas.” In North America and Europe, projects are underway to protect and reintroduce large wildlife, including predators, and reverse habitat loss.

Pleistocene rewilding seeks to restore ecosystems from ten thousand years ago – for example, by introducing elephants, lions, and cheetahs to protected areas in the American Great Plains.

Rewilding aims to save animals and ecosystems, but a project now underway in Siberia is “a radical geoengineering scheme” with a human-centric goal: to slow climate change.

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During the last Ice Age, vast areas of grasslands beyond the edges of glaciers locked up huge amounts of carbon in Siberia (not something universal in the Arctic.) As today’s permafrost melts, release of all that carbon dioxide threatens to create a positive feedback that would accelerate global warming and make climate change worse for you and me – and our progeny. But returning these areas to Pleistocene grassland could slow or prevent the change by keeping “permafrost frozen by giving it a top coat of Ice Age grassland.”

All we need are the animals that created that grassland ecosystem. Horses, bison, musk ox, and reindeer have already been moved into what was once a Soviet-era gulag of gold mining, but the project needs something bigger – mammoths.

Cloning may jump into your mind, but it’s not likely. DNA degrades even when frozen and we may never find a viable mammoth cell. But mammoths are closely related to elephants, and scientists from across the globe are working to resurrect the mammoth by turning on genes that will adapt elephants to the Arctic climate by giving them heavy coats, thick layers of fat, and smaller ears, among other changes.

That seems like the easy part. If embryos are eventually created, they can’t be placed in surrogate elephant mothers – Asian elephants are endangered. So artificial wombs are needed.

A womb isn’t just a bucket of fluid.

The mammalian mother–child bond, with its precisely timed hormone releases, is beyond the reach of current biotechnology. But scientists are getting closer with mice… [There are] hopes to deliver the first woolly mammoth to Pleistocene Park within a decade.

Even if the technical problems are solved, there’s still a cultural issue. Elephants – and, no doubt, mammoths – are highly social animals.

Older mammoths would have taught the calf how to find ancestral migration paths, how to avoid sinkholes, where to find water. When a herd member died, the youngest mammoth would have watched the others stand vigil, tenderly touching the body of the departed with their trunks before covering it with branches and leaves. No one knows how to re-create this rich mammoth culture, much less how to transmit it to that cosmically bewildered first mammoth.

It’s an amazing, overwhelming undertaking. But there are people out there working on it. Perhaps we’ll see reconstructed, de-extincted mammoths in our lifetime.

Thanks to theatlantic.com for their article, with some help from wikipedia.org.

Filed under: Neat Science News Tagged: Arctic permafrost is melting, artificial womb, climate change, cloning, elephants, global warming, Mammoth Steppes, nature, Pleistocene Park, rewilding, Siberia, wildlife

Absolutely Free Collection Short Science Fiction/ Fantasy limited time so this is your chance #shortstory #free #flashfiction #bookworm

[image error]From a ship mining helium-3 in Jupiter’s atmosphere, Kelly launches a probe to search for life in the ocean of a Jovian moon. In the title story, Jupiter Diving, she finds more than she expected. If you missed out on ebook week earlier in the month, here’s another chance. I’m about to offer Jupiter Diving and other Short Reads on Amazon but you can download an advance copy for free.

Visit colorful and dangerous worlds in short stories and flash fiction. From an angel’s photo op on Mars, to the agony of a berserker warrior, a tiny craft’s interstellar mission, and an astronaut’s cries for help, you’ll find many new tales plus opening chapters and vignettes from my On Mars series, the multi-generational story of the first colony on Mars. Plus a few pieces of microfiction too

Faith Meets Death From Forgotten Past to Today #poem #poetry #anthropology #death

Grave Goods

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Museum replica of Viking burial inside a ship as coffin

Found in their graves

From ancient times old,

All they possessed

In silver and gold.

Their weapons and tools

And their finest clothes

Would somehow transcend

To follow their souls.

This marks us as human –

Where our bodies lie

The pollen of flowers

Bloomed over goodbyes.

What will you take

With you when you die?

To a hole in the earth

That leads to the sky?

By Kate Rauner

[image error]All my books, including collections of my science-inspired poetry, are available at Amazon, Barnes & Noble, iTunes, Kobo, and other major online retailers. You’ll also find paperbacks at Create Space and all major digital formats at Smashwords. The second edition of Rhyme and Reason is available now – newly expanded with more poems from physics, biology, learning, and more. Now on Amazon and all your favorite on-line stores.

 There are so many archeological studies of burials it’s hard to pick one, but a recent article inspired this poem. Read about a Neanderthal flower burial – maybe – at wikipedia.org

Filed under: Poetry Tagged: burial practices, death, grave goods, poem, poetry

Revealed – Truth Is, Zebras Don’t Have Stripes on Skin – is that Weird or Not? #nature #biology #animals #genetics

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Taken by Muhammad Mahdi Karim

This may not be the most important piece of news, but zebras are solid black under their striped coat.

 Skin color and hair color are controlled by different genes, hormones, and other factors, says Barsh, who studies the genetics of animal color patterns… citing domestic cats, domestic dogs, horses, zebras, and cheetahs as examples. nationalgeographic

I know that’s true with my llamas. Now, tell the truth. You’re about to go brush the hair backwards on your dog or cat to check, aren’t you? Go ahead! Be a citizen scientist.

Filed under: Neat Science News Tagged: animals, biology, citizen scientist, color of hair coats fur, genetics, nature, skin color, zebra, zoology

Last Day of Ebook Week – Awesome Discounts and Free Books #free #bookday #ebook #giveaway

[image error]Don’t let time zone comfusion defeat you. Get your discounted and free ebooks on Smashwords now, before ebook week ends. Start with my collection of short scifi and fantasy reads at https://www.smashwords.com/books/category/1213/newest/1/promo_SFREE/any/

Prefer novels or poetry? Got you covered! Go to Glory on Mars or Rhyme and Reason Three and use coupon code SFREE to get a free download through March 11. All major digital formats available!

Thanks to the dozens of you who have already downloaded these ebooks

Focus on a Sign of Spring #Haiku #poem #poetry #insect #spring

[image error]First roly poly[image error]

Creeps from the thawing compost

A true sign of spring

by Kate Rauner

 

 

 

Pill bugs, roly polies or doodle bugs – much nicer names than woodlouse

Bug images licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported

Filed under: Poetry Tagged: bug, haiku, insect, isopod crustacean, nature, poem, poetry, roll up bug, signs of spring, soil biology

Don’t Miss Out on Ebook Week – Awesome Discounts and Free Books #free #bookday #ebook #giveaway

[image error]It’s ebook week and you’ll find loads of discounts and promotions all week on Smashwords – look for some of mine, too. Start here https://www.smashwords.com/books/category/1213/newest/1/promo_SFREE/any/

Prefer novels or poetry? You’re not left out! Go to Glory on Mars or Rhyme and Reason Three and use coupon code SFREE to get a free download through March 11. All major digital formats available!

 

[image error][image error]Emma wants to explore Mars in her robotic walkabout suit, but something’s terribly wrong at this near-future Mars colony.

Poetry inspired by science – astronomy, biology, humanity, environment, and more.

 

 

 

Filed under: Kate's Books, Poetry, Science Fiction Tagged: ebook week, Fantasy, free all major digital formats, free ebooks, giveaway, science fiction, SciFi, short stories

Announcing Ebook Week Starts Today Awesome Discounts and Free Books #free #bookday #ebook #giveaway

[image error]Today’s the start of ebook week and you’ll find loads of discounts and promotions all week on Smashwords – look for some of mine, too. Start here https://www.smashwords.com/books/category/1213/newest/1/promo_SFREE/any/

Filed under: Neat Science News